High Roller In Today’s ECONOMY

The insurance industry contributes almost $200 billion to the United States’ gross national product each year, approximately 2.4 percent of the total GNP, according to the latest edition of a study compiled by the Alliance of American Insurers. The Alliance study, ‘The Insurance Industry: A Key Player in the U.S. Economy,’ provides facts and figures on insurance industry employment and payroll by state, industry investments and how much households spend on insurance. According to findings of the report, the industry currently directly employs 2.5 million people, with a total payroll of approximately $100 billion. Of the total employment figure, 700,000 are employed by p/c insurers, one million employed by life/health insurers and 800,000 employed as agents, brokers and in other directly related service industries. The report also revealed that the insurance industry as a whole paid $9.2 billion in state premium taxes in 1998, ranging from nearly $12 million in Wyoming to $1.2 billion in California.